Welcome to my blog all about the things I love to grow and cook. You'll find a collection of seasonal gluten-free, dairy-free and vegan-friendly recipe posts, as well as a round up of my gardening throughout the year. I wish you good reading, happy cooking and perfect planting!
Hello there. What a glorious month to be outside in the garden. All the fine weather we had back in the spring has produced some fine garden blooms this year. Fortunately we have had some rain to revive everything and currently Mother Nature is providing us with a good balance of sunshine and showers which is helping keep everything fresh. The bank of blue geraniums and yellow day lilies is one of my favourite floral combinations at this time of year.
The bees love them too. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
Golden lilies. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
It’s been a great year for Campanulas. The wall variety is crammed with flowerheads and the taller varieties are popping up all over the garden.
Scottish blue Campanulas. Images: Kathryn Hawkins.
The old rambling rose in the back garden has been a victim of its own success this year. It has grown so tall and produced so many flower heads it is too heavy on top for its stems underneath and has to be tied back. The scent is as wonderful as ever.
Rambling rose bush. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
More delicious scents in another part of the garden, from the peonies, also popular with our little winged friends.
Perfect, petaly and perfumed. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
Amidst all the rainbow colours in the garden, these bright white Delphiniums are putting on a lovely show this year.
Ice white Delphiniums. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
One of the more unusual plants in flower at the moment is the Phlomis with it’s tufty flower heads that remind me of tiny pineapples.
Fabulous Phlomis. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
My sunny Sunday garden. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
That’s all from me for now. I hope you have a great few days and are able to get out and about in the sunshine. Until next time, thanks as ever for stopping by 🙂
Scottish garden Lupins on a sunny day in early June. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
Hello again. I hope you are well and enjoying better weather than we are at the moment. Fortunately I took my photos of the garden earlier in the week before the weather turned unseasonably chilly and wet. Aside for the glorious colours outside right now, it has been hard to believe that it is actually June!
Peachy-orange Lupin. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
The Lupins started flowering earlier this year and subsequently many of the flowers are now going over, especially after getting a pounding by the heavy showers. Behind the Lupins, the yellow daylilies grow. For the short time they are in flower, the contrast with the blues of the lupins and geraniums is glorious, and their scent is very perfumed.
Bold and bright, yellow daylilies. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
The garden was full of Aquilegia in May this year which is unusual, 2-3 weeks before they usually flower. Most were over quite quickly, but these ones are lingering on in a shadier part of the garden. The one growing on top of the wall is very hardy and seems to enjoy being “king of the castle”. I have tried to sow the seeds elsewhere but it never seems to take anywhere else.
Violet Aquilegia growing on the top of an old wall; a deep blue Aquilegia and delicate lilac-coloured Meadow Rue. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
At last the peonies are coming out. Just a few single blooms at the moment with their delicious sweet and perfumed scent wafting around the flowerbeds.
Fragrant June Peonies. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
I lost quite a few of the lilac globe Alliums this year. Only a couple came up and they got blown over quite quickly. These 3 varieties seem to be a bit more hardy and are coping well with the elements.
This pale pink Lupin was one of the first to flower this year, brought on by the sunshine of last month and better weather at the beginning of the month, it is a little bit more sheltered than the others. The pink Bistorta grows very well in the garden and the bees love it. The foxgloves and pink cranesbill geraniums are also favourites of our little flying friends.
All the pinks. Top: Pink Lupins and Bistorta. Bottom: close-up on pink foxglove and cranesbill geranium. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
That’s my garden round up for this month. I’m back in the kitchen for my next post. I hope to see you in a couple of weeks when hopefully the summer will have returned 🙂
The most colourful time of the year. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
Everything in the garden is blooming. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
Hello again. It’s been a very different June this year here in central Scotland. Having had a very warm May with little significant rain, the first 3 weeks of June followed along the same lines. Subsequently, many of the flowers that are usually around for at least a couple of weeks have bloomed early and only lasted a few days in the heat and drought. The weather has broken now, but it has left me wondering what the garden will look like in July and August with so many favourites having bloomed early.
Early June Allium. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
Back at the beginning of the month, the Alliums were blooming proudly and looked striking with their tall long stems and intricate star-shaped flower heads. Usually, June is all about Lupins and foxgloves. This year they began flowering in May, and sadly by the middle of the month, they had faded and dried, and the few second flowers also came and went. The foxgloves still have a few flowers at the top of their very long stems, and the bees are still managing to collect pollen from the bell-shaped blooms that remain.
Purple, orange, pink and white lupins earlier in the month. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
Flowers and bees in early June. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
I think the biggest mark of difference in the garden this summer, are the geraniums and day lilies. Both usually provide colour into July, but all the geranium petals have fallen, and only a very few day lilies are left to flower.
Midsummer blue and gold. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
So here we are at the end of the month. There are still a few peonies in bloom providing rich colour and delicious fragrance, and the old rose bush (which hasn’t failed yet) is looking and smelling wonderful at the moment.
Mid June Peonies. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
Bloomin’ marvellous. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
I’ve started harvesting produce from the greenhouse. The baby cucumbers I’m growing were about 3cm long at the beginning of June, and this week, I picked the first couple of fully formed fruit. In the shady parts of the garden, the wild strawberries have done well again this year.
First pickings. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
June 2023 wild strawberry harvest. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
At ground level, these two Dianthus varieties are my favourite plants in the garden at the moment. If I keep removing the spent heads, I am hoping that new buds will keep forming and that there will be flowers for a couple more weeks yet.
Lilac and pink Dianthus. Images: Kathryn Hawkins
I’m closing my post with a flower that’s just opened up this week. The first of many (I hope) Japanese Anemones in the garden. This one’s about 2 weeks ahead of schedule. And that’s me, until next time, have a great few days and thanks for stopping by 🙂
Early white Japanese Anemone. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
Fuschia-pink peonies in full bloom. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
I hope you have all been enjoying some warm sunshine these past few days. The temperature has shot up in the UK and we have all been experiencing long, hot, summer days, and records have been broken every day this week.
I am away from home this week and I know that when I return at the weekend, the lush garden I left behind last Saturday will probably be looking less so. This week’s post is a look back at one of my favourite garden flowers, the peony, which I captured before I headed away.
Sunlight through peony petals. Image: Kathryn Hawkins
There are 4 varieties of peony in the back garden. All have the delightful sweet fragrance that these blooms are renowned for, and to me, they are one of the quintessential old-fashioned blooms of and established flower garden.
The last day of the month is the time for me to catch up with how the garden produce is coming along.
The weather, here in Perthshire this month, has been a real mixed bag. A few sunny days along with some pretty miserable and wet ones. We have had several blustery winds and a couple of much cooler nights. All that said, the garden is looking good.
I keep a sowing and planting diary from year to year, and take a few pictures of the garden each month in order to keep a progress record. Compared to previous times, most of my edibles are at about the same stage as usual, but the runner beans and potatoes seem to be a bit more advanced – fingers crossed, I may get an earlier harvest! The fruit trees are bearing much more fruit than ever before as they become more established in the garden – last year was a poor season with no apples on the miniature trees, only a handful of plums and a solitary pear. I have much higher hopes for this year’s harvest.
From top left: Concorde pears; miniature “Solo” apple tree; Glen Ample raspberries, Hinnonmaki Red gooseberries. From bottom left: Brodie F1 Brussels sprouts; Scarlet Emperor runner beans; andin the greenhouse: Gardener’s Delight tomatoes, and Beth Alpha cucumber
My favourite flower bed at this time of year is full of colour, fragrance and delicate petals. It is home to a combination of peonies, Welsh poppies, white and blue campanulas and foxgloves. Sadly the flowers often get windblown and damaged by heavy rain, but there has been nothing too destructive so far.
I have managed to capture a little of its beauty in the image below.
My favourite flower bed. Image copyright: Kathryn Hawkins
I adore peonies; their perfume is quite overwhelming – I only wish I could post the aroma via my blog. I inherited 4 varieties in this bed, they were very well established when I got here. I have no idea of their varieties, but these are my favourites. They have bloomed without fail for the 12 years I have had the garden; I hardly ever do anything by way of maintenance, except give them an occasional feed.
My Virtually Free-from Kitchen 